Today is a Writing Day

Today is a writing day... a me, me, me day, though I started early with work (writing) for the farmers market and kitchen cleaning and even managed meal planning and shopping/date with the hubby.

In the last several days I have found myself reading recollections of 9/11, but purposefully avoiding any television coverage and actual video replay of the day. It's somehow easier to take in words at my own pace that to be bombarded with images. My son is ten years old. It is him, as a baby, that I clung to that day as I watched the news and the images of the towers falling. Those pictures remain fresh in my mind as if they were yesterday. It is only this nearly grown boy who helps me remember it was ten years ago rather than yesterday.

Last night I dreamed of being in a house that was on fire. I dreamed I was trying to escape. I dreamed all the exits were blocked and it was dark and the air was thick with dust and I could not find a way out. I dreamed it, but it was not as disturbing as you might imagine because I dreamed that my grandmother was there with me and whenever Grandma shows up in dreams I enjoy talking to her and getting her perspective on things. I actually say things like, "There you are! I've missed you so much." Even when we are trying to get out of a house that is on fire. I asked Grandma why my mother was not there too. The two of them often provide answers to the questions I have trouble voicing. Grandma just smiled and said she came alone this time.

Today we drove by the fire station on our way to the grocery store and I watched the flags wave in the lovely Kansas breeze. I teared up wondering what my mother's take would have been on all of this. Then I thought about our lives today and how my mother would be involved if she were still here. Middle Munchkin is working on a sewing project and I imagined how my daughter would be taking those projects to western Kansas to work with Mom and how much joy my mother would have gotten from sewing with her granddaughter. I imagine my loss times thousands. It is too big, too much to comprehend.

I read other's recollections instead of watching television because I can take the words in at my own pace.